


The Falling World

by Tarlan



Category: Eureka
Genre: Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Trope Bingo Round 3, Zombie Apocalypse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-14
Updated: 2014-02-14
Packaged: 2018-01-11 23:53:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,758
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1179440
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tarlan/pseuds/Tarlan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the rumors started of people falling sick, turning feral, and trying to eat other people reached Jack, he was a three thousand miles from Eureka, having been fired by Eva Thorne a few months earlier. He was also three thousand miles away from a man that he thought he despised until he realized that he wasn't jealous of Nathan marrying Allison, but of Allison marrying Nathan. At the same time, Nathan had just saved the world from a different kind of apocalypse - of the time related variety - and in doing so he realized that it wasn't Allison that he wanted either. He was in love with a man he thought he despised - Jack Carter.<br/>Now, with the world descending into the nightmare of a zombie apocalypse, Jack and Nathan find themselves thrown together in a desperate escape from Washington, D.C., and the equally hazardous journey home to Eureka.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Falling World

**Author's Note:**

  * For [elyssblair](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elyssblair/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Art: The Falling World](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1183851) by [sian1359](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sian1359/pseuds/sian1359). 



> Written for **ApocalypseBang** 2013-14 but also for **Trope_Bingo** Round 3: Hurt/comfort  
>  With many thanks to my beta **Taibhrigh**. I always appreciate your assistance :)
> 
>  
> 
> **Also, with thanks to my artist, Sian1359, for the wonderful artwork!**
> 
>  
> 
> This is the story I started to write for Fandom Stocking but decided it would fit better as my ApocalypseBang story! I hope you like it, Elyssblair.

As the last seconds ticked down, Nathan stared straight into Carter's eyes and smiled.

"See you around, Jack," he stated and activated the device that would synchronize time once more, ending the time loops that threatened to destroy the entire universe. His smile faded as everything outside of the chamber began to disintegrate into tiny white sparkles, caught by the way Jack's pain-filled expression froze before he started to dissolve before Nathan's eyes, his molecules swirling, mingling with everything else in the laboratory. A flash of light made Nathan blink instinctively, and he blinked rapidly several more times to clear the sting of protective tears.

The world came back into sharp focus. He was still in the chamber, still in the Time laboratory and behind him Nathan could hear Fargo's whoop of triumph.

"We did it!"

Ahead of him, still looking straight at him, Eureka's sheriff began to smile brightly despite one arm wrapped tight around possible internal injuries and cracked ribs.

"Good job, Stark."

Stark nodded and smiled tightly. "Thank you, Sheriff... Lupo."

He doubted Lupo noticed his slight hesitation as he could tell she was barely holding onto consciousness. Nathan stepped out of the chamber, managing to deflect a too-enthusiastic Fargo from hugging Lupo - and accidentally hurting her further. He tolerated the hug from Fargo, patting the smaller man on the shoulder before gently pushing him away.

"Guess you have a marriage to get to now," Lupo stated softly, startling Nathan because he'd forgotten all about Allison and the wedding, being too intent on wondering where Jack had gone.

Jack.

A sharp pain hit him that had no physical cause. When he stepped into the chamber, he was 99% certain he was going to die.

Even though every thought rushing through his head should have been filled with regrets for what he could have regained with Allison if he had lived, instead, all he could think about was all the missed opportunities with Jack. His life had flashed before his eyes but the final ones were of Jack - the shock when Carlson deflected a shot and it hit Jack, the amusing way Jack had hopped behind him for protection when Todd had aimed that sonic fishing rod at him, the camaraderie as they worked their way through Global to save Allison.

Jack was gone, and Nathan didn't know whether this was because he had never existed, had never come to Eureka, or had resigned some time in the past year or two. It occurred to him then that he was making assumptions about everything else, including that Lupo was referring to his second marriage to Allison. He was in a parallel or alternate universe, and depending on when everything had diverged from his memories of his own universe, he could not assume anything.

"First, we need to get you to the infirmary," he stated to Lupo, aware that he needed to buy himself more time to figure out what was happening and where he fit into this new universe. He didn't want to risk being sanctioned and the best way to do that was to make Fargo do all the investigative work under the pretense of ensuring ' _time_ ' was stable once more. As they walked towards the elevator he gave his first order.

"Fargo, give me a run down on personnel and major projects currently in operation."

"Um. Why?"

Nathan rolled his eyes. "Because I need to know if any projects could have been affected by the time loops."

"Right. I'll..." Fargo pulled out a tablet and began reciting information that seemed to mirror his own memory of current projects, including references to Allison and Thorne, but no mention of Jack... or Henry. "There are no other time related experiments... unless there are some Section 5 projects?" Fargo looked at him with a fake, expectant grin, as if hoping this would cue Nathan into giving him clearance for Section 5. That at least confirmed that he still had Section 5 clearance, and that was only given to scientists working on Section 5 projects and to the head - or heads - of Global Dynamics.

By now they had reached the infirmary, and after he had helped ease Lupo down onto an examination table, she gripped his arm.

"You should go to your wedding, Doctor Stark. Allison will be waiting."

Nathan shook his head slowly even as her words confirmed that he had intended to remarry Allison today, just as in the old timeline. "Under the circumstances, I'm postponing the wedding."

"What circumstances?" she called after him as he walked away, but Nathan couldn't admit out loud that his need to know what had happened to Jack far outweighed his desire to re-marry Allison, and that alone was a good reason to postpone the wedding.

He made his way to his office, breathing a sigh of relief when it really was his office. He picked up his nameplate, fingers tracing over the letter of his name engraved into the glass as he remembered Allison presenting it to him to celebrate his return as joint head of Global Dynamics; it matched the one he had given to her when she took over after Kim's death. Sitting down behind his desk, he pulled up the window to sign onto the Global system, breathing another small sigh of relief when the passphrase let him in first time. He hadn't looked forward to the idea of having to hack Global's computer system if his passphrase had not worked.

"Now. What happened to Carter?" he murmured as he typed in Jack's name, feeling some of the weight lift from his shoulders when a window popped open with Jack's personnel file.

Appointment terminated.

Thorne's signature was scrawled in the relevant box and Stark pursed his lips tightly when he recalled how he had mocked Jack when Thorne showed him the chart that displayed a rise in incidents since Jack took over as sheriff.

"Statistics don't lie," he murmured, except Nathan knew that in this case it was mere coincidence that the rise started around the same time as Carter becoming Sheriff. The Artifact had arrived in Eureka at the same time and had caused a number of those problems, but as that was a dead project classified at the highest level as need to know, even Thorne might be unaware of its influence on events.

It didn't take long to realize that events had unfolded exactly as they had before, right up until that night when he and Jack had headed through Global together to rescue Allison. So at least now he knew Jack had existed in this universe, and that he had once been the sheriff of Eureka. Unfortunately, it also meant that Kim was still dead, and as Thorne had fired Jack during the Drone problem, Henry was still locked up in a secure facility waiting on the D.O.D. to decide what to do about him. The drone - Martha - was still unaccounted for, having escaped through the EMP field surrounding Eureka, with its creator under arrest for sabotage.

He noted that they were also still investigating an unnatural geological event and had arrested Doctor Coles under suspicion of creating a magma pocket underneath the town in order to salvage his previously tattered reputation. Nathan knew better because Jack had exposed the real criminal, who had used Global technology to produce her own logic diamonds. He sent a few emails that would at least get Coles released and the investigation headed on a new path. He would deal with Martha next, he thought, but instead he turned back to Jack's personnel file as if expecting to see something new appear.

"Damn it," he whispered harshly, fingers tapping out an irritated rhythm on the desktop until he gave into his need to know and sent out the request for a full update.

Moments after hitting the send key, he registered the movement on the threshold of his office and looked up, straightening his shoulders and sitting up taller when Allison stepped into his office. Her immaculately styled hair and make-up seemed out of place against her casual clothing, and Nathan felt a stab of guilt, knowing she had been wearing a wedding dress only an hour earlier.

"Nathan, Jo explained what happened."

"I'm sorry-."

"So am I. Maybe this was for the best."

Nathan stared hard at her for a moment before nodding, knowing from her words and her expression that the wedding postponement had become a cancellation. This had been their second chance, and he knew there would not be a third. Perhaps later he would feel regret but for now all he felt was a desire to find Jack Carter. A small chime announcing incoming data had him looking down, and when he glanced back up only moments later, Allison was gone.

Sighing, Nathan opened the document and felt some of the tension in his body float away as he looked at the photo on Jack's new security credentials.

"Homeland Security, Washington D.C.," he murmured as his index finger traced Jack's strong features. "Agent Jack Carter."

Something warm coiled and twisted inside him as he stared at Jack's face and he cursed under his breath. It was one hell of a time to realize how he truly felt about Jack, and he ardently wished it hadn't taken a near-death experience to figure it out.

He was in love with the damned man, and now he had to find out if the feeling had been mutual. That last look in Jack's eyes before Jack faded into millions of sparkles of light had been full of longing, and Nathan could only hope it had been for him.

****

_Several hours earlier_

Jack rolled back his shoulders in an attempt to loosen the tension that was adding to his already throbbing headache, exacerbated by the rising noise level in the overcrowded office. Across from him, his partner of less than a month was hitting on Agent Darville but she put him down with a witty rejoinder that almost brought a smile to Jack's lips - mostly because Jorgens was a happily married man and the flirting was all pretense. Instead Jack sighed and stabbed at a few more keys as he worked on completing his latest report. He had always hated paperwork at the best of times, and his heart was definitely not in it today.

According to Jo, Allison was getting remarried to Stark today, and though he wanted to be happy for her, he couldn't help feeling miserable for himself. Worse was realizing that it wasn't losing Allison that had him all tied up in knots inside. That ship had sailed the moment she chose Stark over him after the incident with the fictitious man-eating virus at Global - though to be fair, he hadn't been all that upset at her not choosing him, just that she had chosen Stark.

Nathan Stark, bane of his existence.

It had taken being fired by Thorne, and having far too much time to sit around with his thoughts dissecting every second of the past two years, for him to realize that what he missed most about Eureka was not the job, or Allison, or Jo, or having a smart house, or even those fantastic cheeseburgers and Vinspressos that Vincent used to make for him. No, it was the arrogant, obnoxious, egotistic, despotic, tall and insanely handsome Nathan Stark with his neatly trimmed beard, luscious dark curls, sparkling green eyes, perfect abs, and expensive suits and cologne.

And wasn't that the kicker because Jack had never been that interested in men before Nathan Stark had sauntered into his life, half undressed, and turned it upside down.

Okay, so that was a lie. There had been that one guy in High School and the mutual hand jobs that had been mind-blowing, and also that detective when he was a rookie in the L.A.P.D., but that guy had looked like a movie star and had a track record for bringing in the bad guys that was second to none. Even the straightest guy in the division had worshiped the ground Detective Reeves walked on, and Jack had spent a couple of memorable nights between the sheets with Reeves before he was killed during a shoot-out. After that had come Abby, and Zoe... and Eureka.

Jack's only saving grace was that he had managed to walk away from Eureka with his dignity relatively intact as he could only imagine the level of mocking if Stark had figured out that it wasn't Allison who got Jack's engine revving after all. Of course, once Jack had figured out why he was so against Stark getting back together with Allison, he wanted to smack his head against a wall for spending the best part of two years annoying the hell out of the man.

Jo had often told him he was oblivious and that she would have made a better sheriff because of that. In hindsight, Jack had to agree. He'd spent two years pushing Nathan away and chasing after Allison when it should have been the other way around except, looking back, there were times when their snarking had bordered on flirtation. Since leaving Eureka he had spent more than a few nights thinking about his interactions with Nathan during the Fargo-in-the-bubble incident, and especially the ax thing. Had Nathan been hinting that his sexuality was as fluid as Jack's when he told Jack he'd ' _swung a lot of things_ '?

Jack huffed. Now he was deluding himself because Nathan had chosen Allison, and it was all moot anyway as Eureka was nearly three thousand miles away...and Nathan was re-marrying Allison today.

The thoughts chased around in circles inside his head, increasing his headache, and if that wasn't bad enough, he was tired and more than a little worried by the recent reports coming in from scattered areas around the country. So far these were isolated incidents of people falling sick, but the rumors said they were turning feral and trying to eat other people.

Really? he thought. Zombies?

All those zombie movies suddenly took on new meaning, reminding him of when he had threatened to quit his job as Eureka's sheriff if the moving blips in the morgue had turned out to be zombies. In the end it had only been Larry and a few others caught in the lock down, and he hadn't been given the chance to quit because Eva Thorne had fired him a week later despite Allison's objections. Now, only duty - and a healthy amount of disbelief - kept him from making good on that promise in his current job and high-tailing it out of D.C., and only then because he had yet to come across a single zombie. Until that happened, he would treat it as just another rumor from someone with an overactive imagination.

"Carter! There's been a report of an incident outside the Syrian Embassy. Need you and your partner to go check it out."

"What kind of incident?" Jack asked, flicking his gaze at Jorgens, and catching his eye.

Peterson shrugged. "Some guy attacking people... biting them. They've got him closed in but the Police refuse to handle the guy after one of the officers had a chunk taken out of his arm. Witnesses say they saw him shambling out of the embassy, and facial recognition puts him as one of the junior staff who arrived at Dulles four days ago on a direct flight from Syria... Ayman Mussan. The Ambassador is refusing to allow the Police to send Mussan back into the embassy despite him being a Syrian national."

"And that puts him under our jurisdiction as an unwanted foreign national," Jack finished before turning to his partner, who was busy tapping into his computer. "Any priors to explain why they kicked him out?"

Jorgens shook his head. "Nothing so far."

Despite the traffic, he and Jorgens made good time, pulling up behind a Police cruiser. To one side was an ambulance and Jack strode up to the small group of Police officers standing around the opened back as one of their own was bandaged up. He winced at the sight of blood seeping through the bandage and the tight expression of pain on the injured officer's face. A civilian was seated inside the ambulance holding a thick wad of bandaging material against the juncture of neck and shoulder; he looked pale and drawn, which wasn't surprising really. Jack guessed he'd been bitten too.

Catching the attention of the patrol officers, Jack pulled out his I.D. and flashed it.

"Agent Carter, Homeland Security. My partner, Agent Jorgens."

Officer Valentis - according to his badge - had turned immediately and grimaced. "Don't envy you this one. We've had our share of drunks and addicts high on PCP, but this one creeps me out. Also seen my share of dead bodies, and this guy looks... _and smells_ like he died two days ago. If he wasn't still moving I'd be sending for the coroner."

Jack felt a familiar sinking feeling in his stomach, "Yeah, that can't be good. So where...?"

Valentis indicated with his head for Jack to follow and led him and Jorgens to a narrow alleyway between two buildings that had been sealed at both ends by ornate metal gates. The late afternoon sun had cast most of the alleyway into shadow but the deranged guy was at the end closest to the street, snarling and reaching out between the metal bars of the gate towards the small group that had gathered. Fortunately they seemed to have the good sense to stay out of arm's reach but Jack suspected they were caught in the grip of morbid fascination - or what Jack called the _Ghoul Effect_. 

"Okay everyone, let's move on now," he ordered, not surprised when only a few actually listened and walked away. The rest brushed him off like a mild irritant and Jack didn't have the energy to push back harder. It wasn't as if they were in the way. "Let them gawk," he murmured to Valentis under his breath.

Jack left Jorgens handling the crowd while he moved closer to take a look at Mussan, instantly understanding what had creeped out Valentis. His face was bloodless, and all the coloring had seeped out of the man's irises. What was left of the whites of his eyes was almost completely veined in burst blood vessels. His lips were drawn back into a rictus of a snarl and Jack could see a bandage stained with old, dried blood around his forearm. He looked to Valentis in concern.

"Want to bet that's a bite mark?"

His voice seemed to incite Mussan into trying even harder to get through the gate, and Jack felt a moment of fear course through him as the gate shuddered, wondering if it was strong enough to hold.

Casting another, worried glance at Valentis, Jack asked. "You tried a taser?"

"First thing we tried. 1400 volts meant to incapacitate, and he barely noticed. Just carried on chomping down on that poor guy in the ambulance. Rosaro tried to pull him off. Instead he turned and bit him too. Weirdest thing I've ever seen, 'cause this was not just a bite. This was a bite, tear and swallow. Fucking cannibal. Should have put him down with a bullet."

Jorgens came up beside Jack and half-whispered. "What the hell are we supposed to do with this guy?"

The snarling increased as Mussan tried to reach for them, smashing his head against the bars. His lip split open but only a thick, putrid glob of blood slid down his chin. Jack shook his head, wishing Taggart was here with his tranquilizer gun. 

"I have a really bad feeling about this." Thoughts of Taggart gave him an idea and he looked back over his shoulder at the ambulance. "Watch him. I need to get something."

The paramedic refused to offer any assistance until Jack pulled out his badge but eventually handed over a syringe containing enough sedative to knock out an elephant. Of course, Jack still had to figure out a way to get close enough to inject the stuff but figured he was safe as long as the gate held. He and Jorgens split up and approached the snarling man from different directions, and Jack waited for Jorgens to attract Mussan's full attention before ducking in and plunging the syringe into the man's neck. Mussan didn't even flinch - but he didn't go down either, and after twenty minutes had passed with no sign of the sedative working at all, Jack wasn't sure what they could do next except order in a psychiatric team with a straight jacket and some kind of muzzle to stop Mussan from tearing a chunk out of anyone else.

"You're not gonna bring him down that way," someone yelled from the crowd behind them, "He's dead, man!"

Jack checked over his shoulder, seeing a guy holding up some kind of gizmo. He went over and the guy thrust the gizmo at Jack.

"Check it out. It registers heat signatures."

It took a couple of attempts to switch it on but when Jack panned it across the crowd, the figures glowed a bright red and orange. He panned it across at Jorgens and Mussan - and only one figure appeared clearly: Jorgens. Mussan was barely visible on the machine with his body measuring only at ambient temperature and Jack knew instinctively that if this had been a cold night rather than a warm afternoon, Mussan would not have registered at all. 

The guy in the crowd was right. Mussan wasn't alive, and even though he could hear Nathan's voice mocking him for believing it, Jack was suddenly convinced that zombies did exist - and Mussan was one of them.

"This just gets better and better."

****

_A week Later_

"There has to be a logical explanation because, quite frankly, what people are describing is preposterous. There are no such things as zombies. It is anatomically and biologically impossible," Doctor Houston stated pompously in a private meeting with Ronald Maitland, the Assistant Secretary for Health.

"And yet, apparently, they exist," Nathan retorted dryly, having seen too many amateur YouTube videos of horrific attacks to see the sense in denying the obvious.

As usual, the Government was a little late to react and Nathan wished they had brought in his people earlier. Global had one of the most sophisticated and advanced medical facilities in the world, along with some of the brightest virologists, immunologists and pathologists in medical research. The C.D.C. often looked to them for answers, and yet it had been Fargo stumbling across a YouTube video that had called their attention to the latest crisis only yesterday evening. Fargo had thought it was just a sick joke at first and even Nathan had found it hard to believe until he saw a familiar face in a bystander video posted earlier in the week from outside the Syrian embassy.

Jack.

Officer Rosaro, who had been bitten during the incident, had died within thirty-six hours - except he woke up in the morgue four hours later and attacked two orderlies and a nurse on duty. All three had died since then... and come back to attack others.

It hadn't ended there as more attacks were reported around the country, and the pattern was always the same. Someone fell ill after sustaining a bite from someone else. They died, and then they came back as mindless, cannibalistic monsters in human form - zombies. As a mathematician, Nathan had once modeled the spread of an infectious disease so he knew they had to act _now_ before this new pathogen spread exponentially - if it was not already too late. They had to remove all the sick into quarantine, and incinerate the bodies completely after death. However, he knew the dangers were individuals hiding infected loved ones in some mistaken belief that they were not truly dead at all, and already there was a rumor that some of the poorer areas that had limited or no access to affordable health care, were being overrun. If the Government didn't move fast then they would lose control of the situation altogether but instead they were still listening to idiots like Houston.

Yesterday, the Syrian ambassador had stopped taking calls from the State Department and even from his own people. On the long flight in from Eureka, Nathan had learned that the Syrian government had finally relented, realizing that they had no choice but to give Federal Agents permission to enter their embassy.

Homeland Security agents would be entering the embassy right about now, and Nathan had a very bad feeling on what they would find inside.

Nathan glanced at his wristwatch as Houston continued with his insistence that there was nothing to fear, wishing he could drown out the man's whiny voice as easily as he canceled out the tiny clicks on the keyboard as Maitland's personal assistant took notes. All he wanted to do was get out of Washington D.C., and head back to the relative safety of Eureka. He even had a fast helicopter waiting for him on the helipad on the roof, though he didn't intend to take advantage of that until he had contacted Jack.

Nathan had already spoken to someone in Homeland Security to get Jack reassigned back to Eureka, effective immediately. He just hoped Jack listened to reason and agreed to return to Eureka with him, if only to get Zoe to safety too.

A loud thump against the door to Maitland's office startled him and he looked towards it, feeling the hairs rise at the nape of his neck at the silence that followed before there was another ominous thump. Already irritated by Nathan's sharp jabs, Houston stalked to the door and reached for the handle just as Nathan heard a muffled scream through the thick wood. 

He jumped out of his seat calling out too late, "Don't open the door!"

Houston had already turned the handle and he froze in shock as the door was slammed back, splintering the lock. Nathan heard a blood-curdling scream as Houston was grabbed and teeth sank into his neck, tearing out a huge chunk of flesh. Another zombie appeared in the door frame and fell upon the hapless Houston, who was still screaming. As Nathan started forward to go to Houston's aid, he felt a pull in the opposite direction as Maitland's personal aide grabbed hold of him, her fingers clenched into his suit sleeve. The sound of a door banging and locking brought his head round and Nathan realized Maitland had locked himself inside his personal washroom, leaving Nathan and the assistant to fend for themselves.

At that moment, one of the zombies looked up at him with its whitened, lifeless eyes from across Houston's torn and gutted body, and snarled, revealing pieces of torn flesh caught between broken teeth. It started to lumber to its feet and Nathan knew they had to get out of there now. He could see more zombies in the corridor beyond, dragging and tearing at Houston's corpse. Nathan knew they didn't stand a chance getting out that way, and as tempting as locking himself away in a washroom might be, he knew that was simply a slow death option. There was only one other way out and that was through the window, but he had to buy them some time first. Picking up a chair Nathan ran towards the zombie framed in the doorway and rammed it hard against the creature, sending it sprawling back through the door and into the corridor beyond. By now, other zombies had finished dragging Houston away and Nathan took advantage of the moment to slam the door shut and topple a heavy wood filing cabinet in front of it. The door vibrated as something slammed hard into it from the other side, and Nathan stepped back, knowing it wouldn't hold for long. He moved to the window and cursed when he realized it was security sealed shut. A glance around the office had him grabbing an ornate lamp from Maitland's desk and struck the glass with as much adrenaline-fueled force as he could muster. Thankfully, it cracked and another blow shattered the resistant glass.

"Knock out the rest. Start at the sill," he ordered the terrified woman, glad that he had always had the ability to command attention when she grabbed a heavy statuette from the window sill and began to do as he demanded. In the meantime, Nathan yanked out the cabling from various electrical items, quickly tying them to form a makeshift rope that he tied off around the leg of Maitland's heavy oak desk before throwing the rest out of the window. It wouldn't stretch all the way to the ground but it was close enough, leaving just a four foot drop. The banging on the door increased, and Nathan paused for a moment only to see it shudder and the cabinet move back an inch. He checked out the window and saw the ground below was clear of danger.

"Go!" he ordered, pushing the woman towards the window and helping her clamber out onto the narrow ledge. He was tempted to follow immediately but, cursing under his breath, he banged on the washroom door. "Maitland! We have to leave _now_."

"No! Go away!"

Another loud thump on the main door was followed by the screech of wood sliding across the parquet flooring of Maitland's office, and Nathan's breath caught in his throat as bloodied hands clawed round the door followed by one, then two snarling zombie heads. He had run out of time, gazing regretfully at the washroom door before making a decision. Clambering through the window, Nathan grabbed the cabling rope and climbed down, looking up when he heard a sound above him. One of the zombies was trying to follow him and he watched as it toppled out of the window, clawed hands grabbing for him as it fell past, catching but ripping away his suit jacket's pocket, and landing on the ground below him. With horror, it ignored its broken bones and began to struggle to stand up.

Praying that the cable would hold, Nathan began to swing like a pendulum, waiting until he had a good arc before letting go and allowing the momentum to throw him clear of the zombie. He landed awkwardly but, fortunately with only a minor twinge in his ankle. The zombie was still trying to crawl towards him on its belly having failed to gain its feet, and Nathan backed away from it.

Above him he heard the helicopter engine start up, feeling his hopes lift and then fade when he saw it lift into the air with more than a dozen zombies clinging to the landing struts, pulling it off balance with their combined weight. Nathan ducked and ran as the helicopter tilted, its rotor blades striking the wall of the building with pieces of metal zinging off in all directions as chunks of masonry began to fall. He cried out as a piece of metal sliced across his biceps but kept running hard until he was swept off his feet by the shockwave as the helicopter exploded on the ground behind him.

Ahead of him Nathan could see Maitland's assistant cowering behind a tree in the only cover close by, looking shocked but whole.

"Have you been bitten?" he demanded and she shook her head. "Come on."

He knew he would have to find another way out of D.C. and back to Eureka and yet at this moment, as the world he knew began to fall apart around him, all he could think of was finding Jack Carter. With everything going to Hell, he knew Jack would be heading in only one direction - to find Zoe - and the high school she attended was only a few blocks away according to the information he had read from Jack's personnel file.

Nathan could only hope he would find her there - and with her, her father.

****

Jack had seen a lot of bad stuff while in the U.S. Marshals, and even in Eureka but nothing had prepared him for the carnage they found inside the Syrian Embassy. He saw two fellow agents go down beneath a mass of snarling zombies, ripped to pieces before his eyes, and there had been nothing he could do to save them. Claw-like fingers had grabbed for him too and they would have got him too, but Jorgens had managed to pull away the one that had been about to tear a chunk out of the side of his neck. Jack shot at it twice but it still came back at him.

He yelled into his radio. "We're under attack. We're under attack."

The dispatcher responded. "Sending reinforcements."

Jack shoved the radio into his pocket and fired off another round. This time he aimed for the head, and it went down immediately.

"Head shots!" he yelled, because so far nothing else had seemed to stop these creatures.

Only problem was the sound of gunshots attracted all the others, and not just inside the embassy. He could see creatures violently pawing at the windows and he knew it was only a matter of time before they broke through. The sound of smashing glass came from both sides.

"I hate it when I'm right," he said under his breath and backed out of the room fast, closing the door and hoping the creatures had forgotten how to open doors because he had no way to lock or barricade it.

Another noise behind him made him twist in time to slam aside a zombie that had stumbled up behind him from a hidden corner of the room. It hit the floor hard but was scrambling back up immediately, clawing its way towards him. Jack aimed and fired, heart sinking when all he heard was the click of an empty chamber. It was his back-up clip so he knew he was out of bullets. Feeling sick inside, he grabbed the nearest heavy object, an ornate metal lamp and used it as a weapon to bludgeon the creature, slamming it down over and over as adrenaline kicked in harder, crushing the skull and splattering brains and blood everywhere. He dropped the metal lamp, feeling numb as it clattered to the marble floor, and backed away a step before another snarl snapped him back to his currently dangerous predicament.

Jack darted forward and snatched up the lamp again, wielding it like a baseball bat as he fought his way back out into the large reception hallway. An almost hidden door under the staircase pushed open a fraction and Jack turned towards it, the lamp raised ready to strike, only to see the frightened eyes of a woman. He lowered the lamp and held out a hand. 

"Come on. You can't stay in there," eyes darting around the hall as another Homeland Security agent come hurtling through, covered in blood like something from a slasher movie, and Jack knew he probably looked no better. He darted a glance back at the woman. "Please!"

She pushed the small door all the way open and ran over to him with three small children close behind her.

More of the zombies were entering the hall and Jack wondered where they were all coming from because he didn't think the embassy had this many staff. Then he realized that not all of them looked Syrian. They had to be coming in from outside, attracted by the gunfire and smell of fresh blood in the air.

Jack glanced around in dismay when he saw only six out of the ten agents who had entered the embassy with him, and two of them were bleeding heavily from bite marks. Three more civilians had come through with them, making seven civilians altogether. There were too many zombies now and Jack knew they couldn't afford to go find the others. They had to get out. Behind him the main door shuddered as if dozens of hands were thumping on it, and a quick glance through the side window sent his hopes of escaping that way crashing. Looking around, he spotted a stained-glass window where the stairs took a left turn halfway up. It was their only hope.

It seemed almost sacrilegious to destroy such a beautiful piece of work but Jack used the metal lamp base to knock out the glass while Jorgens and Martinos thumped on their side of the main door to keep the zombies' attention focused in that area.

"Higgs! You go first. Catch the kids."

Hanging from the window ledge left a six foot drop that Higgs made easily. Jack grabbed each child in turn and dropped them into Higgs' waiting arms, then he helped the woman and the other civilians through. By now Jorgens and Martinos had backed partway up the stairs, kicking and shoving at the zombies trying to reach them.

Martinos looked back up and yelled, "Go!"

Jack pushed Jorgens towards the window, then tapped each of the other agents in turn until it was just him and Martinos left. The chilling scream had him lunging forward, grabbing hold of Martinos as the zombies pulled him down. Zombie fingers snagged on Jack's boots, catching the laces and pulling him off his feet too, his head smacking against a step, and he watched in horror as the zombie bit down on his boot, shaking his leg free and kicking it in the face, hard. By now Martinos was gone, his eyes open and lifeless, his belly ripped open with ropes of his intestines being fought over by the ravenous monsters.

Jack gained his feet and went through the window, hanging for a moment before letting gravity take him. Jorgens had him on his feet moments later and started dragging him away. Only minutes away from the embassy, they stopped and looked around in shock as people walked past them, giving them a wide berth and wide-eyed stares. Jack wiped a smear of what was probably brain matter from his cheek, only then noticing that his hands were shaking. It was if they were standing in another world.

Hands gripped his shoulders and dragged him round and he blinked into Jorgens' face.

"It's over, man! It's over! We've got to get out of the city while we can. I got a wife and kids. If we leave now we'll stand a chance."

Screams erupted from the direction they'd taken from the embassy, and Jack watched in horror as the first zombie lurched around the corner, snatching up a woman and biting down. A dozen black SUVs came up fast and Jack watched as agents in full tactical gear deployed. He had holstered his gun automatically when it ran out of bullets and it was back in his hand now even though it was next to useless without a fresh magazine clip.

For a moment Jack felt torn between duty and common sense as he watched the agents head in, until Jorgens' words seeped in. Wife and kids. Kids.

"Zoe," Jack breathed. He had to find Zoe and make sure she was all right.

The advantage of having worked with Henry in Eureka was a godsend as he bypassed the security system in a car parked by the curb and started the engine on the first try. As he joined the normal D.C. traffic, it seemed hard to believe what they had just gone through. People stared out at them in horror and fear from other vehicles but Jack kept his eyes forward, intent on the road, and his jaw tense. Eventually he pulled over outside their Homeland Security headquarters.

"Greg... Take the car and go. I need to report what happened, and then I'm going to get Zoe." 

Finally he looked across at Greg Jorgens, scrubbing a hand through his short hair, and only then realizing his hand and now his hair was sticky with blood and who knew what else. Jack grimaced as he caught sight of his reflection in the rear view mirror. The world was going to Hell and all he could think about was Zoe... and Nathan, and Henry, and the friends he had left behind in Eureka. He made the only decision he could. 

"I'm planning to head west, which means I'll be passing through your neighborhood. Get supplies and I'll meet you at your house."

Greg nodded, reaching out to clasp Jack's forearm in a gesture that wasn't lost on Jack. It was comradeship, gratitude and a silent prayer that they would meet again - alive rather than undead. Jack clasped Greg's forearm in turn before letting go and climbing out the car. He waited by the curbside while Greg moved to the driver's seat and watched for a moment longer as Greg pulled away before turning to enter the building.

Inside it was chaos, and Jack watched in confusion as people rushed around. One of them grabbed the large water bottle out of the cooler and started off, pausing for a moment to stare at Jack guiltily before staggering away. When Jack reached Peterson's office he found the man seated behind his desk yelling down the phone.

"Then send more units! Call in the National Guard!"

Peterson waved Jack to a seat without glancing up, but when he did finally look, he froze with the handset pressed against his ear.

"The Syrian embassy?"

"Overrun with zombies. It was pure carnage in there. We got a few civilians out but lost several good men in the process."

Peterson began speaking down the phone. "Did you hear that? Yes... I need more supp-."

"Sir, I've got to go. I have a _daughter_."

Peterson held the handset against his shoulder and stood up, reaching out his free hand to Jack, and Jack took it.

"You're a good man, Jack. Get your daughter and get out of D.C.. Avoid the cities until they get a grip on this thing. And Stay safe."

Jack nodded. "You too, sir."

On the way out, Jack made a quick detour to the washroom after grabbing his go bag and all the ammunition he could carry from the cupboard behind his desk. He pulled off his bloodied clothing and filled the sink with warm water, plunging his whole head under to wash the blood and brains out of his hair and off his face. He pulled a handful of paper towels from the wall machine and dried himself off as best he could before pulling on a clean polo shirt.

Zoe's school was a twenty minute drive across town on a good day, but judging by the mayhem he found when he reached the street a few minutes later, it was going to take him a lot longer today. His car was still in the garage beneath the building and he quickly joined the stream of slow moving traffic heading in that direction, glad he had taken the time to work out a few back routes when he hit the first snarl up. Eventually, it became obvious that he was moving slower than he could walk, so he pulled over to the curb and abandoned the car. He guessed he could always hot wire another, grateful to a misspent youth, and to Henry once more.

Several times he caught sight of lumbering figures, and he quickly moved away from them, knowing it was better to avoid making a noise and gaining their attention. It took him an hour but he finally turned the last corner. The gate to Zoe's school was closed, with the janitor stationed close by, letting parents in and out to collect their children. He looked terrified but determined to do his job, and Jack nodded his respect to the old man as he was let onto the school grounds.

Jack ran the final twenty yards to the reception area and followed the stream of other frightened parents.

"All the children are in the main assembly hall," the receptionist called out over and over as parents hurried by alone in one direction and with their children in the other.

The noise in the assembly hall was deafening, and it made Jack nervous because he knew the zombies were attracted to sound. He could only hope that the traffic noise of car engines and blaring horns was drowning it out. Parents were yelling out for their kids and Jack had no choice but to join in the call.

"Zoe!" He pushed his way through the crowd, trying to spot her blond hair among the sea of kids and parents. "Zoe!"

"Dad!"

He saw her and pushed a little harder, apologizing automatically. Suddenly she was in his arms and he held her tight to his chest, breathing in the scent of her hair. He felt her push at him.

"Dad. Choking me!"

"Sorry, sweetie. I was just-"

"We have a visitor."

"What?"

She pulled at him, forcing him to make a half-turn. Jack froze when he spotted the tall, dark-haired man in a torn suit standing barely three feet away, who still managed to look artfully tussled rather than bedraggled. Jack felt his breath catch in his throat, partly overjoyed to see Nathan again while the rest of him was terrified that Nathan was in danger too.

"Carter."

"Stark. What are you-?" Jack choked out but then he narrowed his eyes as another thought struck him. "Wait. Did you cause a Zombie Apocalypse?"

"What?" Nathan blinked and then seemed to realize what Jack was asking. "No. It wasn't us." He moved forward. "Jack, we need to get out of the city. We need to get to Eureka."

"Right. Right. Let's go."

"What? We can't, dad! What about Tina... and Mike? Their parents are out of state."

"Zoe, if we stay here, we will all die." Her eyes widened almost comically and Jack sighed, looking around and realizing that most of the teachers had already gone and soon there would be no one left to look after the kids whose parents never came for them.

"Jack. You can't save them all," Nathan stated softly, and Jack closed his eyes for a moment as if he could hide from that terrible truth. He opened them and stared hard at Nathan. 

"But we can save some of them." He turned to Zoe. "Get your friends together. They'll have to come with us, and we can help them find their parents later when we're all safe." Zoe hesitated so Jack used his hard voice. "Now, Zoe."

She nodded and grabbed hold of three or four different kids her age and one younger kid who was obviously a sibling.

"Come on."

Jack waited until they were most of the way towards the gate before stopping everyone, making them group around him.

"These things aren't people any longer, and they want to do worse than hurt you. They're _monsters_ and they are attracted to noise. We move fast. We stay silent. Got it?" Jack flicked his gaze up to Nathan and caught his nod of approval. "Okay. Let's go."

Nathan came up beside him.

"What do you have planned?"

"First? I'm going to boost another car... and you're going to help me."

*****

Hacking the on-board computer of an abandoned SUV was child's play for Nathan and once he had the engine started, they all climbed in. It was a tight squeeze with six teenagers and Nathan's stray - Evie, Maitland's assistant - crammed into the five seats in the back but no one complained when Jack took shotgun, especially when he pulled out several guns and started double checking them.

"You ever shoot a real gun before?" Jack asked, and Nathan gave him a look of contempt. "Of course you have," Jack answered his own question and placed a handgun onto the dashboard within easy reach of Nathan. "You don't use this unless you have to because, one, we don't have that many bullets, and two-."

"Noise attracts them," Nathan finished.

Jack nodded, features going tight so Nathan guessed he had learned that lesson the hard way. "Yeah."

"So what did you use?" Nathan asked, and when Jack looked confused, Nathan tapped a spot behind his own right ear. "Brain matter." Jack seemed to get the message and lifted his hand.

"Eeewww!" Zoe stated right behind them as Jack pulled the missed glob from just behind his ear.

He held it between his fingers for a moment, comically looking around the interior of the SUV before rolling down his window and flicking it out.

"Not the only person who has swung a few things, Stark."

Nathan grinned in remembrance even though what Jack said painted a macabre picture. He recalled that Jack was a baseball fan, and had some boyhood dream of becoming a pitcher before a car accident in his teens brought that dream to a brutal end.

"Go for the head shot. It's the only way to put them down."

Nathan glanced across and nodded his understanding.

It had only been a week since he had last seen Jack, but that had been in a different universe, and yet a week was long enough for him to realize how much he had missed having Jack around. Just hearing his voice, scenting the faded, cheap yet familiar bodywash still clinging to his skin, and feeling the warmth of his body seated so close was enough to ease some of the tension from him for the first time in a week. He just wished their reunion could have been under better circumstances because there was so much he wanted to say to Jack, and so much he wanted to know in return. However, escaping a ' _zombie apocalypse_ ' - to use Jack's words - with six passengers crammed in the back of the car behind them was not the right place to start an intimate conversation.

The traffic was moving more smoothly the further they were from the center of the city, but it was still slow going. More like the end of a commuter day than the dawn of an apocalypse, with people gliding off exits into the suburbs surrounding D.C.. Except new cars ladened down with possessions and frightened kids were starting to join them now. The drivers were nervous, holding on to the steering wheel in a white-knuckled grip with their focus only on the road ahead of them. It seemed that the rules of the road had stopped applying to them as they cut across traffic to get that one car further forward, ignoring the blaring of horns from other angry motorists.

By now night had fallen as it had taken them more than an hour to get across the Potomac in the slow moving traffic. All he could see was a stream of red taillights ahead of him and just the occasional set of headlights of a car heading back into D.C..

"Take the next exit on the left," Jack ordered.

Nathan cast a querying glance towards him, but he couldn't help but feel relieved that they were leaving Route 50. He had an ominous feeling that one of those idiots was going to crash and bring them all to a standstill. Then they'd be trapped with no recourse by to head out on foot.

"My partner lives out this way. I said I'd swing by on my way out of the city with Zoe so we could meet up." Jack gave a half-smile. "Figured two trained agents was better safety than one man protecting his family alone."

They pulled into a darkened neighborhood in West Falls Church lit only by starlight and a yellow-orange moon lying low on the horizon. It was too quiet and Nathan fancied he saw curtains twitching as people hid inside their houses in the dark. He spotted debris littering the driveways where people had discarded items that couldn't fit inside whatever vehicle they drove. Another car had been abandoned at an angle to the curb, its hood left up. Jack indicated towards a small house halfway down the road and Nathan pulled over, pausing for a moment before cutting the engine. As much as he would like to keep the engine ticking over in case they needed to move fast, he knew the sound would echo and draw any zombies towards them.

Jack climbed out but shut the car door softly behind him with barely a click. Nathan felt his heart hammer in his chest as he watched Jack move slowly up the path to the door, eyes flicking constantly to watch for danger. When the door opened a fraction, letting a small glow of light illuminate the path, he tensed and picked up the gun, almost jumping when he heard a nervous whisper in his ear.

"Doctor Stark?"

He cleared his throat. "Just being cautious," he whispered back in response to Zoe's unspoken question, lowering his window and sending a glare back over his shoulder when two of the kids started talking. They shut up immediately.

He saw Jack crouch down and realized he was talking to a small child, a little girl of perhaps five or six. Jack glanced back over at Nathan, and his expression, barely visible in the moonlight, looked pained and troubled. He stood when a woman joined him at the door, and Nathan felt his own anxiety crank up another notch when Jack followed her inside.

"Come on, Jack," he murmured under his breath, breathing a sigh of relief when Jack came out a few minutes later and headed quickly towards him. He rolled down the window a little further.

"Jorgens got bit on his way out of the city. He's really sick. Feverish, but he got their car packed up ready to go. It's in the garage as he didn't want to leave it exposed on the street in case someone grabbed it." Jack's jaw set in a familiar stubborn way. "I'm not leaving him."

"So what do you want to do?" Nathan asked because he knew Jack well enough that he couldn't simply demand that he abandon his partner, even if he had only known Jorgens for a month or so at best. Jack was not that kind of person, and though that sort of loyalty was an admirable trait under normal circumstances, Nathan already knew from the C.D.C. reports that they had yet to find anyone who had survived a zombie bite. He just knew it was a waste of time arguing over it.

"I'll take Jorgens' car and follow you."

"You know he's not going to make it," Nathan insisted in a low voice.

And there was that stubborn set of jaw again as Jack nodded tightly, acknowledging Nathan's words but defiant anyway. "I'm not leaving him behind."

Nathan sighed. "Then put the kid in here with me."

"Two kids."

Nathan opened his mouth but thought better about objecting. Instead he indicated for Evie to take Jack's place in the passenger seat and waited as a lady, whom Nathan assumed was Jorgens' wife, led two small kids over. Zoe reached for them immediately, setting the small girl down on Tina's lap and hugging an even younger child - a boy - to her chest. He waited another anxious ten minutes before he saw the garage door open slowly, and realized it was likely electric but with the power out it would have to be cranked open manually.

The noise echoed along the quiet street, setting Nathan's nerves jangling. As soon as he heard the car engine, he rolled up his window and started the SUV, pulling away slowly and picking up speed only when he was sure Jack was following. Shambling figures came out from between the buildings and he heard Evie's sharp intake of breath as one figure stepped partway into the road in front of them. Nathan caught sight of a garish face frozen in a snarl, and those almost inhuman eyes, before he swerved a fraction, clipping the zombie and sending it spinning away.

He found a road that ran parallel to Route 50, intending to cut into the traffic further along but changed his mind when he realized the cars on the highway were stationary. Rolling down the window a fraction let in the sound of car horns blaring, and beneath that the screams of people in a panic. He cursed under his breath because he should have got Jack to figure out a few different routes just in case, or even spent the time compiling alternative routes while waiting for Jack outside Jorgens' house.

"You know how to work a satnav?"

Evie shook her head but Zoe piped up from the seat behind him. "I do."

He could feel the slight rocking movement of bodies changing position in the car seats behind, and then Zoe was leaning between the front seats and tapping keys on the satnav built into the dashboard. He'd forgotten how clever she was and wondered if she had ever gotten around to telling her dad the truth about her I.Q. score. Within minutes she had a new route mapped out for them with several alternatives to cover any eventualities. It was a guilty thought but Nathan was secretly pleased that Zoe was still in the car with him, and not just for her quick mind; her presence meant Jack would keep following no matter where he led him.

About four hours later, Jack veered sharply and Nathan slowed, pulling to a stop at the edge of the road as Jack's car went sailing by. They were between towns and though a fair amount of traffic had flowed with them for a time, now there were just occasional cars passing by. Fortunately, Jack didn't clip any of them, eventually sliding sideways to a halt several hundred yards up the road. Nathan moved his car in closer, but cut the engine and shot out, running towards Jack's car when his headlights illuminated a struggle taking place inside. The gun was in his hand and he aimed it as the driver's door opened and Jack fell out, trying to crawl away and kicking back at something behind him. The metallic scent of blood hit him as Jorgens dropped out of the car behind Jack. Except it wasn't Jorgens any longer and before Nathan realized what he was doing, the gun jumped in his hand as a shot rang out, taking off half of Jorgens' head.

He reached Jack and fell to his knees beside him, shocked as the headlights picked up the bite-sized tear in his shoulder and the blood pouring down his chest.

"Marie..." Jack demanded and Nathan looked glanced into the inside of the car, feeling the bile rise to his throat as he took in the blood splattered everywhere, and Marie's dead, accusing eyes staring straight at him. Movement had him spinning on his knees, the gravel cutting through his suit pants and into skin but it was only Zoe.

"Stay back," Nathan ordered, but she was a true Carter and simply ignored him, rushing straight to her father's side.

"Daddy!"

****

"Stupid. So Stupid," Jack murmured over and over as Nathan pressed a thick wad of material against his shoulder. Jack reached up and grabbed his arm. "You know how this ends, Nathan. Don't be stupid too. Leave me here."

"No." Nathan shook his head sharply. "No."

A snap of twigs had them looking towards the shrubs and trees lining the road, and Jack squeezed Nathan's arm harder in a bruising grip. "You have to leave me," he gritted out.

"No." Nathan pulled Jack's tightly gripping fingers from his arm easily by pulling back on his little finger.

Zoe's sharp inhale had Nathan looking back at Jorgens' car in time to see Marie's eyes flick towards them and her lips draw back in a snarl. Before Jack could push Nathan away, suddenly terrified for both Nathan and Zoe, he was choking back a cry of pain as Nathan dragged him bodily to his feet and began to haul him back to the SUV with Zoe supporting his other side.

"Nathan-."

"I don't have time to argue with you, Jack."

Using some good sense, Evie clambered out and squeezed into the back with Zoe and the others while Nathan shoved Jack into the passenger seat. A scream inside the car had Nathan spinning in time to brutally shove away a zombie that had suddenly come out of the trees, and Jack could only curse in fear as Nathan kicked shut the passenger door and took a half leap and slide across the hood to get to the driver's side. Another car passed, illuminating the ever-increasing numbers as more zombies shambled towards them from the trees, but it didn't stop to help. Fortunately, he knew Nathan wasn't prone to panic and saw him remain cool and collected, starting the engine and pulling away fast and smooth.

Jack felt the sting of tears that had nothing to do with his own pain as they drove past Jorgens' car, watching as the creature that used to be Marie crawled out and reached for them futilely. Looking back, he saw her silhouetted in another car's headlights before falling beneath its wheels. He hoped it had fully killed her, regretting that he'd been forced to leave her in that state. She'd deserved better.

Behind him he could hear Jorgens' kids pitifully crying for their mom and dad, and his heart broke a little for them.

"What happened, Jack?"

"She said he was sleeping. Stupid. So stupid."

Jack relived the horror, the sudden movement behind him and Marie's screams that cut off in a gurgle as he saw Jorgens rip out her throat. He knew she was dead instantly, and then came the indescribable pain as Jorgens ripped a chunk of flesh out of the top of his shoulder as Jack fought to stop the car without rolling. Only years of training had kept him from losing control of the car, reminding him of the only other time he had lost control - during a rainstorm, when a dog had run out in front of him and he'd skidded on the wet road. He'd ended up in Eureka that day with Zoe, but he didn't think that he'd be so lucky this time.

A thought struck him and he grasped Nathan's upper arm. "She shouldn't have turned so quickly."

"Jack?"

Jack pushed the wad of blood-soaked material harder against his shoulder. "She screamed when Jorgens attacked. She was alive when he tore out her throat."

Nathan looked horrified. "But that was just minutes-."

"Exactly. I thought it took _hours_. Rosaro was in the morgue for four hours. I thought I'd have plenty of time after Jorgens died to... Stupid." He half-turned in the seat. "Nathan. No one survives a bite... and I don't want to hurt anyone. You've got to do it." He fumbled for his gun but lost the grip in blood-slippery fingers. 

"No. You need to hang on, Jack. We can be in Eureka in less than two days and they may already have a cure to-."

"Nathan! I'm not going to last that long. You have to listen-."

"No, Jack. I don't."

Jack sighed heavily because he knew that stubborn tone and look all too well, but he could be stubborn too. He'd make Nathan see reason soon enough. "Then at least handcuff me to the door, just in case."

Nathan nodded tightly, and Jack was glad that he was at least listening to some common sense. With both hands handcuffed to the passenger door of the SUV, Jack wouldn't be able to reach anyone to hurt them if he died and turned in a matter of minutes like Marie.

"I'll pull over as soon as we're far enough away. Treat that shoulder."

Jack nodded, flinching at the small hand touching his face before leaning into Zoe's hand.

"Daddy?" Her voice was small and frightened, and his heart broke a little from knowing he could do nothing to take away that fear. He tried anyway.

"It's going to be okay, Zoe," he stated softly, but he didn't believe that for one second, and he knew, neither did she.

The road Nathan was following brought them crossing under Route 50 before running parallel again, and as it seemed remarkably clear of heavy traffic, Nathan pulled onto it.

"We'll make better time on here rather than meandering on smaller roads."

Jack nodded, and felt himself drifting a little. He startled awake when the car stopped. The moon had risen higher, casting a sickly light over the land and Jack nodded his head in approval because Nathan had chosen a spot where the fields backed up against the road on both sides. They could see in all directions for quite some distance. He listened as Nathan woke the older kids and Evie.

"I need you to stay focused. Keep a watch for anything that moves. You see anything... you come tell me. No one wanders more than ten feet from the car at any time. If you need a comfort break then you take someone to watch over you. No more than ten feet away though under any circumstances." 

It was his ' _Head of Global Dynamics_ ' voice that brooked no argument, and had left many a scientist quaking in their boots, but it drove home how serious the situation was.

The older four kids climbed out and took up their given positions while Evie led the three younger kids aside to make sure they went to the toilet. Once Nathan was satisfied, he pulled open the passenger door and helped Jack out, seating him on the floor with his back propped up against the now closed passenger door.

Zoe brought round a medical kit and a decent-sized battery-powered lamp, having found both tucked in the trunk. Unfortunately there was nothing else. No food or water, and Jack regretted that they hadn't taken the opportunity to stop and redistribute some of Jorgens' supplies. Zoe hung the lamp from the passenger door handle to cast better light over Jack, and began laying out the contents of the medical kit for Nathan. It was surprisingly well stocked for a town car.

"This is going to sting," Nathan murmured before using sharp surgical scissors from the kit to cut through Jack's shirt and uncover the bite wound. Jack turned his head but couldn't see the damage, gaining a gentle push against his chin from Nathan.

"Hold your head still." Nathan murmured before turning to Zoe. "I can handle this alone, but I need you to keep a look-out for danger, and for the others while I focus on your dad. You understand, Zoe?"

Zoe hesitated but nodded, leaning in to kiss Jack on the cheek. "Back soon, dad."

"Don't go too far. No more than ten feet, remember," Jack called out softly, hating to have her out of his sight even for a minute but he and Nathan needed to talk freely.

"How bad?" Jack asked.

He laughed in self-deprecation at the absurdity of his own words, especially given Nathan's pained expression. The size and damage from the bite really didn't matter. It was just a matter of time before he succumbed to the virus spread through the bite, and he could already feel the ache deep in his bones like a bad case of the flu. His head was throbbing too, matching the pulsating pain in his shoulder. He'd been bitten once before, on a fugitive hunt, and was lucky not to have lost a chunk of flesh then but that guy had only wanted to cause him pain rather than eat him. The scar had faded over the years but he'd needed a whole bunch of shots to counter any infection. At the time he'd never realized a human bite could be so nasty, and now it was definitely fatal.

"Least now we know why they've spread so quickly... in just a week," he stated softly, knowing Nathan would understand what he was talking about.

He bit back on another cry of pain as Nathan cleaned out the wound, not wanting to scare the kids. It was stupid really but he'd often dreamed of having Nathan's long, agile fingers touching his skin, but not like this. He needed a distraction and asked the first thing that came into his head.

"How's Allison?"

"We canceled the wedding."

"I'm... sorry."

"No you're not." Nathan stopped his cleaning, but then grimaced and continued "And it was mutual."

They fell silent. Jack hissed as Nathan tapped a thick bandage over the wound.

"Mutual?" he choked out.

Nathan looked cagey for a moment, and Jack wondered if he was going to be handed that old chestnut about it being classified.

"Something happened that caused me to... re-evaluate certain relationships."

"You got cold feet?" Jack teased as Nathan pressed two painkiller tablets out of a blister pack and handed them to Jack. He waited until Jack had dry-swallowed the tablets before continuing.

"No. I realized that I was marrying Allison for all the wrong reasons. Taking the easy way out." He cleared his throat. "I realized I was in love with someone else. Someone I spent a lot of time pushing away."

Jack felt gutted by this admission. "Anyone I know?"

Nathan rolled his eyes. "How can you be this dense? It's you, Jack. You. I love you."

Jack's heart seemed to swell in his chest at this declaration, before he remembered that they had no future. He was dying. "Anyone ever tell you your timing sucks?"

"Sadly, yes. And you haven't answered me, Jack."

He frowned because he didn't recall the question. He looked into Nathan's eyes, and saw the fear lurking in there, suddenly aware of how hard it must have been for Nathan to lay it all out in the open like this - to take that chance. Jack felt the sting of tears again, hating that he was feeling so emotional, so out of control, because he wasn't normally that kind of person. He was the stoic one; the man who stayed dry-eyed through ' _tear-jerker_ ' movies. Abby had once accused him of being too emotionally closed off because he didn't cry at funerals... but he'd been to so many of those over the years. Too many. It was the bitter price he paid for being in law enforcement.

It had to be the pain, he thought, and the fact that he was dying, and now it was too late for him and Nathan.

"Jack?"

He owed Nathan some honesty though, and nodded. "That night in Global, when we went to save Allison and Kevin. Afterwards, you were on the couch. The three of you tucked up together like a family... and I realized I wasn't envious of you being with Allison. I was envious of Allison being with you."

Nathan's big hands enclosed Jack's face and he leaned in, and his kiss was hard and desperate, and everything that Jack felt too. "I don't want to lose you, Jack," he murmured harshly against Jack's lips. "I only just found you again."

And this time Jack couldn't hold back the tears flooding down his cheeks as he wept quietly for everything he could have had.

"Doctor Stark? I thought I saw something moving."

Nathan pulled back, and Jack saw him scrub a hand across his face before he called out. "Get everyone back in the car. We're leaving. Now."

He helped settle Jack back into the passenger seat and sighed heavily when Jack snapped his handcuffs around one wrist and held it out for Nathan to loop through the inside door panel. Jack refused to look away, proving how stubborn he could be too and Nathan gave in. He reached across and snapped the handcuff around the other wrist, taking a moment longer to let his finger caress Jack's skin.

"The hell with it," Nathan murmured, and leaned right over to kiss Jack again, stunning Jack into silence at this open declaration, before pulling back quickly and starting the engine. With his hand cuffed to the door, he couldn't even reach up to brush his fingers over his tingling lips, licking them instead to try to recapture Nathan's taste.

Zoe padded up a jacket to use as a makeshift pillow so Jack could lean his head back comfortably. He felt her small fingers against his hair and let her lean through the gap between the front seats one last time to kiss his cheek as the car moved off. She was smiling as she flicked a sad glance at Nathan.

"It's cool, dad."

Nathan took his eyes of the road for just a second and ordered, "Get some rest, Jack. I won't let you hurt anyone. I promise."

It was uncomfortable being handcuffed to the door, especially as it pulled on his shoulder wound, and he was so hot and thirsty, but Jack nodded and closed his eyes. He and Nathan may have fought many times when he was sheriff and Nathan was head of Global Dynamics, but he had trusted Nathan then, and he still trusted him now to keep them all safe... even from him.

****

The small pinging sound from the dashboard might as well have been a knell of doom because it meant they were almost out of gas. Nathan was surprised they had gotten this far before running low but this SUV model probably had a large tank, and it had registered almost full when they started out yesterday afternoon. Fleetingly, he wondered what had become of its owner but he didn't regret taking it because it had not been just his own life at stake but Jack's too, and the kids crammed in the seats behind them.

An hour had passed since he had patched up Jack by the roadside, and the fever had already set in, leaving Jack's face warm and sweaty. The rapid onset of the fever for those who survived the attack, and the even faster turn after death certainly explained the exponential rise in the number of zombies. However, it didn't quite explain why the cellular towers in D.C. had gone down around the same time as the attack on the government offices, which Nathan considered highly suspicious. Landlines were down too, and this had stopped him from contacting Eureka and having them arrange alternative transportation for him.

He had lost his cell during the attack but he had yet to meet a teenager who didn't have a phone glued to their hand these days, so he had recited the number to Zoe, asking her to try calling once every hour. He listened as she tried the number again but gained the same ' _out of service_ ' signal. Nathan knew better. The signal was being blocked and that pointed towards a terrorist attack, which in turn indicated that this zombie plague might be a new form of bio-terrorism aimed at the West.

However, the rest of the world was not his concern right now. His immediate problem was this car and the small group of mostly kids inside it.

"We have to stop again as we're nearly out of gas. Zoe, see if you can find the next gas station on the satnav."

"But what if there are monsters there?" Tina asked in a scared voice, and he glanced at her through the rear view mirror.

"The worst is probably behind us... and we don't have a lot of options."

"Farms," Jack murmured weakly. "This SUV is diesel. It'll run on tractor fuel."

"But that will damage the engine-."

"Over time."

Nathan was about to argue and then sighed, "Of course," wanting to smack his head against the steering wheel. 

A car engine needed the lubricants in normal diesel to keep the engine running smoothly. The diesel used in agriculture equipment lacked those lubricants and would wear down the fuel pump seals, and there was also a possible problem with the fuel injectors, but Nathan could improvise to make that work. They only needed the SUV to get them as far as Eureka. Hopefully, in just two more days at most.

He saw a turn-off for a farm and made a decision, reaching the farmhouse along the unlit track about twenty minutes later after some slow and careful driving. For some reason he hadn't expected the place to be occupied so he tensed as the porch light came on, illuminating the space between the front door and the car. The door opened a fraction and the barrel of a shotgun poked through. Nathan climbed out of the car slowly, telling the kids to stay inside and remain quiet. He spread his arms to show he wasn't armed and meant no harm.

"What do you want?"

As the head of Global Dynamics he had spent a lot of time dealing with politicians, schmoozing with senators and generals, but Jack had shown him that pure honesty had its place too. This older man was a normal, hardworking farmer; someone down-to-earth like Jack, and not a sleazy politician.

"We're running low on gas and hoped you might have some to spare."

"Oh my, is that a child?" a woman's voice came from behind the man. Nathan glanced behind and saw Tommy Jorgens' face pressed up against the window.

"Gwen, stay back."

"Oh John! It's a car full of kids."

John seemed to know when he was defeated and dropped the barrel of the shotgun as Gwen pushed by him. She moved towards the car and Nathan indicated for Evie and the others to get out. Being squashed up in the car for hours on end had stared to take its toll on the kids anyway, with the younger ones starting to get fractious. They needed to walk around for a while to work off that extra energy, and this farm seemed safer than most places - at the moment.

"Have you eaten?" Gwen asked, and Nathan shook his head. 

"Not since yesterday afternoon."

"Bring them all in," she ordered. "They look starved."

"Who's that in the passenger seat? Why's he not moving?" John asked suspiciously, and Nathan hoped honesty wasn't going to get them sent on their way without any assistance as that would be as good as a death sentence.

"He's sick."

"Did he get bit by one of those things?"

Nathan hesitated, having secretly hoped these people were remote enough that they didn't know what was going on. He nodded.

"Yes."

John nodded gravely. "My work hand got bit too. He's upstairs. Sick with fever. Said some guy all bloodied and ragged just launched himself at him like a rabid dog." By now he had reached the car and was peering through at Jack. "Why have you got him cuffed?" John indicated towards Jack.

"You mean, you haven't-?"

"What? Tied up Jeff?"

"No one survives a bite," Nathan tensed again, looking at the farmhouse ominously. "When he dies, he will turn into... one of those rabid people. He will attack you. And then you will get sick too."

"Now you've got me worried, mister, but I've known Jeff all his life. I can't just take your word on it that he'll die."

"At least restrain him so he can't hurt you if I'm right."

John stared hard at Nathan for a moment longer, and then nodded in agreement. "How about we get your friend some place more comfortable while you get something to eat and maybe take a nap. You look tired."

Nathan scrubbed a hand over his eyes. Tired didn't cover how he felt. He felt exhausted and drained, physically and mentally. The man he loved was dying, and his world had been reduced to keeping himself, Jack, Evie and a bunch of kids alive in the vain hope that Eureka had shored up the town's defenses and had a cure to save Jack. He smiled wryly as he recalled Allison paraphrasing Jack's insistence on the benefits of power naps but Nathan couldn't deny that he needed one right now, or he would end up falling asleep at the wheel, and that would be fatal for all of them.

"Maybe 40 minutes... an hour at most."

Nathan insisted on accompanying John upstairs to check on Jeff. The man was far sicker than Jack, with several nasty bites, mostly on his forearms where he'd tried to defend himself. Nathan made sure Jeff was securely restrained before heading back downstairs, not wanting to place an unnecessary risk on the safety of the people in his care. With John's help, he brought Jack inside the farmhouse and settled him onto the couch.

"Handcuff me to the..." Jack nodded towards the wooden armrest on the couch, and Nathan was too tired to argue, making sure Jack had several cushions beneath him to make him as comfortable as possible. He stroked a hand down the side of Jack's hot and sweaty face, feeling the roughness of bristles on his unshaven cheek, smiling when Jack leaned into the caress.

Gwen placed her hand on Nathan's shoulder and he startled, having forgotten she was there. He allowed her to lead him to a well-stuffed chair opposite Jack, barely an arms' reach away, and he sank down into it with a heavy, tired sigh.

"Why don't you have a bite to eat, and then take the spare bed upstairs and get some sleep. I'll watch over him and the children, and I'll call you if anything happens."

Nathan wavered for a moment but the desire to stay close to Jack was too strong. "I want to stay with him."

She nodded. "Then at least be comfortable." She handed him a pillow that she must have brought back down with her from when they had checked in on Jeff, and smiled when he looked at her in surprise. "I thought you might say that." Her eyes flicked to Jack momentarily. "He must be someone important to you."

"Yes. He is."

She rested her hand on his shoulder again, eyes full of compassion, before moving off to look after the kids. Nathan looked up from where he was sitting and saw Jack's fever-bright eyes focused on him, a small, wry smile playing about his lips.

"I love you, Jack," he whispered softly, wanting to tell Jack over and over how much he was loved because Nathan was a realist; he knew that the chances of Jack surviving were slim even if they were magically transported to Eureka right at this minute. Jack seemed to understand though, and his smile gentled.

"You too."

Thumping in the room above startled Nathan awake and he realized in shock that he'd fallen asleep between one breath and the next and had slept soundly for over two hours. He straightened up and stared around the room groggily. On the couch, Jack was sleeping fitfully but Nathan could see he had a fresh bandage covering the bite. Zoe was sitting in another chair, and her eyes were bright and fearful, and raised to the ceiling.

Shaking off the last of the lethargy, Nathan stood up.

"Stay here with your father," he ordered, and made for the stairs, taking them three at a time. Pushing open the door, he saw Jeff struggling against his restraints with Gwen and John standing back, unsure what to do. Jeff turned his head and snarled, and his eyes were the familiar milky-white and red of a zombie. His fingers were making clawing motions as he tried to reach for the living people in the room, teeth snapping towards them.

"I'm sorry," Nathan murmured, and indicated for John to send Gwen out of the room.

"Go on, Gwen. Go check on the kids."

Nathan listened for her feet heading down the stairs before looking at John. "You know he's dead, right? He's not... Jeff anymore."

John nodded. "I know. So what do we do. I mean... If he's already dead then..."

Nathan looked around the room until he spotted the poker in the small bedroom fireplace of the old-fashioned farmhouse. He picked it up and sighed.

"Only way is to destroy the brain," he murmured, recalling Jack's words about head shots. He looked at John. "You don't have to be here for this."

"Yes, I do. And this is my responsibility. Not yours. Though I thank you kindly for the offer," he stated softly, holding a hand out for the poker, and Nathan wondered if he could be just as strong if - when - it came to Jack.

He stood back and watched as John approached the thing on the bed, placing the sharp end of the poker on Jeff's forehead. He heard John whisper, "I'm sorry," before forcing the poker down hard, through bone and into the brain. Jeff stilled immediately, finally at rest.

"I'll help you carry the body downstairs. It's the least I can do."

John nodded his thanks and wrapped the bloodied sheets and blanket around Jeff's corpse, using the rope from the restraints to tie him up. It took a little effort but between them they took Jeff's body outside and placed it into a hole that John obviously used as a fire pit for burning trash, judging by the burn marks. John sprayed a little lighter fluid over the top and dropped a match on top before standing back. Flames licked at the body, quickly consuming it and Nathan moved away as the stench of burning flesh turned his stomach, fortunately standing up-wind to avoid the worst. That was when he realized that this had possibly been a mistake. If he could smell this then maybe the zombies could too, and would follow the trail back here.

It was too late now. The deed was done, but he knew he should get the car refueled and packed up right away, and persuade John and Gwen to come with them. He owed them that much.

"Do you have a car?"

"An old thing but she's reliable."

The farm was surrounded by open fields and the sun had already risen just above the distant tree tops before they started the fire. Nathan's overactive imagination could visualize the shadows beneath the trees moving.

"Come with us."

"This is our home."

He pointed to the fire, and started kicking at the dirt surrounding it, smothering it with earth. "I think this was a mistake." He glanced towards the distant tree line again, not seeing anything at first but the hairs were rising at the back of his neck as his sixth sense kicked in. "Trust me. You don't want to stay here any longer."

In the distant, a black dot appeared at the tree line, and then another. John straightened as Nathan pointed it out, and nodded. "I think you're right, son."

They rushed back into the farm house and began issuing orders, leaving a confused Gwen, Evie and the older girls to gather up supplies of water and food while John, Nathan and the older boys started filling gasoline canisters and refueling both cars. Nathan didn't want to have to stop again to hunt for gas unless he truly had no choice. Gwen collected some personal possessions too, and Nathan gave a wry smile as she bundled several photo albums into the truck along with the other supplies. He couldn't blame her though, for not wanting to leave all of those precious memories behind. Marie Jorgens had probably done the same, though he held out only a little hope that they would be able to salvage those from the Jorgens' car one day - for her children.

He blinked, wondering when he had begun to feel so nostalgic, but he pushed aside those thoughts quickly. He raised both eyebrows as John mixed gas with the agricultural fuel without a second thought or taking exact measurements. Nathan turned the SUV's engine over, breathing a sigh of relief when it worked on the first try because he didn't think he had time to fix the fuel injectors. He nodded. He should have figured John would know the right mix to make good use of the cheaper farm fuel.

Once everything was done, Nathan went back inside for Jack, carrying him in a fireman's lift back to the car and handcuffing him at Jack's insistence. The first of the zombies reached the farmhouse as they were pulling away, and another stepped off the track in front of Nathan's SUV. He put his foot down and ran right over it, feeling the sickening crunch of flesh and bones beneath the wheels. In daylight it took only half the time to reach the highway and he turned west. They were back on the road, heading for Eureka.

"Try the number again," he asked Zoe.

It rang and rang, but just as Zoe was about to hang up, she almost dropped the phone as a tinny voice came through.

"Who is this?"

"Allison!" Nathan yelled from the front seat. "Zoe, put it on speaker."

****

"Nathan? Oh my God, Nathan! Where are you?"

Jack straightened slightly as he heard Allison's voice but it was difficult with the handcuffs holding him firmly in place. He watched as Nathan quickly glanced down at the satnav before looking back up at the road ahead.

"Close to Seymour, Indiana."

Jack tried to picture where they were and how far they had traveled from D.C. but his head was throbbing painfully. He knew there were at least three thousand miles between Washington, D.C. and Eureka, so they'd probably only traveled a quarter of the way to Eureka - if that. Not far enough really, and it would take longer with just Nathan at the wheel. Jack had intended to split the driving between the three of them - him, Jorgens and Nathan - not wanting to trust Evie as she seemed to startle every time they went over a bump in the road. At least taking care of Jorgens' kids had given her something else to focus on other than her fear.

His thoughts slid to his dead partner, and Marie, hearing her scream cut-off in a gurgle. So stupid. He'd made assumptions based on what he'd seen and they'd both paid a high price. He groaned softly, realizing that his thoughts were jumping like one of those unstable wormholes that Fargo had talked about one time. Unstable wormholes sounded bad.

"There's a local airfield just outside Indianapolis." 

Allison gave the details and Zoe leaned forward automatically to put them into the satnav. Jack shrank back from her, making a mental note to warn her not to do that again as she'd come far too close to him. Close enough for him to have attacked her if he had turned while they weren't paying attention. He blinked, trying to concentrate on Allison's next words. 

"I can have a military transport plane from a nearby base there in just over an hour."

"Needs to be big enough to take a dozen adults and kids."

"It will be."

"Allison..." Nathan paused, keeping his eyes firmly ahead as he watched the road. "I have Jack with me."

"Jack. Oh thank-."

"He was bitten."

The other end of the phone went silent and Jack knew Allison was caught in a battle between pragmatism and the heart, the same as him and Nathan. He knew she cared for him, perhaps even loved him in her own way, though he was glad now that she hadn't been in love with him - or Nathan. He swallowed hard, feeling guilty at that last thought because this would have been a lot easier on Nathan if they hadn't had strong feelings of love for each other. He might have been able to persuade Nathan to leave him behind - with his gun. Nathan glanced across at Jack quickly, noting that Jack was lucid for now even though he had remained silent so far.

"How long ago?"

"About 9 hours. I'm not leaving him behind." He glanced at Jack again, with a pointed expression, having stated this as much to Jack as to Allison. 

Jack was not surprised when silence fell again as Allison would recognize the stubbornness in Nathan's tone. God knew Jack had heard that tone on too many occasions to count, and he also knew it was a waste of time trying to move Nathan from whatever path he'd chosen to follow once he used that hard tone of voice.

"Then take precautions. We've seen reports of as little as twenty minutes before returning as-."

"Three." Jack stated loud enough for Allison to hear.

"Jack?"

"Three minutes. I've seen someone die and come back in less than three minutes. Got the bite mark to prove it," he added bitterly.

"Then you have to consider-."

"Jack already lost this argument with me, Allison, and insisted on being restrained as a compromise." His voice softened. "I won't let him hurt anyone."

He heard her sigh in resignation. "Just be careful, Nathan. One hour. Jack..." Her voice was heavy with emotion.

"It's okay, Allison."

"No it's not."

"I know."

The call ended and the car fell silent. About twenty minutes later, Nathan indicated to turn off and checked in his rear view that the farmer's car was still behind them. John, Jack thought. The man's name was John, and he and his wife had taken them in and fed them, and in return all they'd brought was trouble to their door. Except that wasn't strictly true. The zombie plague had already reached them and if they hadn't ' _stumbled_ ' across them, then it was likely they would be dead - or zombies - by now because of the other sick guy. Nathan had put Evie, Tina and Jorgens' kids into John's car to give the rest of them more space inside this car. Or more likely, Nathan had been taking extra precautions for Jack's sake, not wanting small children being noisy or getting out of control when they got tired. Jack remembered Zoe being hard work at that age, always into something if they took their eyes off her for even a second. He recalled one day when she got hold of the diaper rash cream as a toddler and liberally smeared it over every surface in the den. Jack had been digging the stuff out of the TV speaker grill for days. She hadn't gotten much better as she grew older, dismantling things... running away.

As if his thoughts had conjured her, Zoe placed a cooled cloth against his forehead before offering him another painkiller. It was hard to swallow and he was grateful for the water bottle pressed against his lips. Some of it spilled but he didn't mind because it was cool against his heated skin.

"Thanks... but you need to stay back, Sweetie. Check before you lean through in case-." Her tiny face screwed up and her eyes went bright with unshed tears. "Hey! It's okay."

He glanced across at Nathan, pleadingly, momentarily meeting the sad green eyes before Nathan turned back to watch the road ahead; expression grim and unrelenting.

"I'm not leaving you behind, Jack."

"I know."

Half an hour later, they heard the heavy engines of the transport plane coming in to land. Jack figured they still had a mile or two to go but the plane would come to rest at their end of the runway. Minutes later, they were inside the airfield and heading towards the plane, which was already in the process of turning, ready to take off again. Jack knew they would have to move fast as the engine noise would attract every zombie for miles. In the distance he could already see small dots shambling towards the plane, with some much closer than others. Probably people who were at the airfield when they died. Ahead of them the plane's door opened and a ladder descended. Nathan pulled up sharply about twenty feet away, staying clear of the wings.

"Everyone get on-board now. That means you too, Zoe," Nathan ordered even as he climbed out and raced round to Jack's side of the SUV.

"You still with me?" he asked, and Jack gave a slight nod and a soft smile as Nathan quickly freed one wrist and leaned in, draping Jack over his shoulder and striding quickly to the plane with his burden. It hurt, and the blood rushing to his head made him feel even worse, and it took all his control not to throw up, knowing Nathan wouldn't appreciate it in the slightest.

An airman hesitated for a second before helping Nathan carry Jack up the short flight of stairs into the plane. They dropped Jack onto a hard bench seat and he struggled upright to glance through the small port window.

"Come on! Quickly," another airman called out as Gwen and John pulled items out of the truck of their car.

The airman ran over to assist, freezing when John turned, aimed and fired the rifle he was holding. Jack watched as the airman glanced over his shoulder and Jack didn't need to see through his eyes to know that one of the zombies had almost reached him.

"Strap him in," Nathan ordered as he pulled out the gun that Jack had given him a day earlier.

Jack heard the crack of gunfire and saw at least two zombies, who were getting too close to the plane for comfort, go down immediately. As soon as the others were inside the plane, Nathan helped the airman pull up the stairs and seal the door even as the plane began to move along the runway, quickly picking up speed.

Nathan quickly checked on Jack before strapping himself in just a few feet away, and Jack breathed a sigh of relief once the wheels left the ground and they were climbing, feeling safe for the first time since leaving Washington D.C. two days earlier. He knew they could be in Global Dynamics within a few hours, especially if they landed at the airstrip close to Eureka rather than at the airport in Portland. He knew Global would already have every resource working on this zombie plague, and that gave him the slim hope that they would find a cure for him in time. If not then he trusted Nathan to do the right thing, and at least Zoe would be safe too.

Once the plane had reached the right altitude and leveled off, Nathan unbuckled his restraint and sat down beside Jack on the bench seat. He accepted a couple of blankets from an airman and folded up one for Jack to use as a head rest, trying to make Jack feel as comfortable as possible considering the austerity of military transport planes. Jack appreciated the effort because his body was aching deep to his bones like the worst case of flu ever. He was hot and cold, his throat hurt and his head was throbbing, almost but not quite masking out the pain in his shoulder from the bite.

"I need to change that dressing again," he stated softly in an apologetic tone because they both knew it would hurt Jack.

Jack nodded.

One of the airman brought over a medical kit and Jack watched as Nathan went through it, pulling out the necessary equipment and bandages. If Jack thought the medical kit in the SUV was well stocked then it had nothing on this one. By the time Nathan had finished, Jack was shaking from pain and exhaustion, and he accepted some cool water for his aching throat gratefully. He barely noticed the pin prick of a hypo amid all the other aches and pains, but the drug flooding through him brought a modicum of relief.

"How are you doing?"

"I've been better," Jack replied even as the Morphine took the edge off his pain. His lips twitched into a smile before he scrunched up his face as a fresh wave of pain rolled over him but at least it was duller than before. He felt a cool cloth wiping across his face, the soft brush of fingers through his sweat-soaked hair, and a finger caressing the shell of his ear.

"Rest now, Jack."

Jack closed his eyes, no longer having the energy to argue as the full force of the fever descended upon him.

****

Nathan wiped a damp cloth over Jack's face, knowing it was a waste of time trying to quiet the delirious man. He heard his name and Zoe's spoken over and over, sometimes murmured, other times yelled in alarm. If not for his promise, Nathan would have released Jack from the restraints as the thrashing had taken its toll on Jack's wrists, leaving them almost rubbed raw in places. The fever had climbed so high that Nathan feared Jack would have a seizure, and all Nathan could do was give him a shot from the medical kit, keep him as cool as possible, and try to get him to drink some water.

He knew it wasn't enough, but it was all he had.

Zoe sat hunched up a few feet away, which was as close as Nathan would let her come. He wished she didn't have to see her father like this but he couldn't persuade her to move away; it seemed stubbornness ran strong in the Carter genes. Worse, she had all of Jack's ' _street smarts_ ' and a high I.Q. too, so he knew there was no point trying to soften the blow with false reassurances. Allison had not heard of a single person who had survived being bitten - 100% mortality rate - which increased Nathan's suspicion that this had been a genetically engineered plague rather than a natural event.

If it was man-made then he hoped they had created a cure before they unleashed this plague. Unfortunately Nathan had seen the arrogance of scientists first hand, and had witnessed fanaticism too. It could be a lethal combination - _was_ a lethal combination if his theory was correct that this was an act of terrorism.

Bio-warfare was something they took seriously at Global Dynamics, though Nathan had the Global labs focused on cures rather than on the creation of bio-weapons. That was a line that he refused to cross but he knew other facilities or governments might not be so morally inclined. His thoughts turned back to when Allison was affected by Diane Lancaster's sonic waves, producing a toxin in her body that caused a bioluminescent reaction. He had worked tirelessly, looking for the cure for the bio-toxin using his other research, and yet he had failed to find it in time to save her. In the end, Kevin had used the energy of the artifact that was inside him to cure his mother.

The artifact was gone now, destroyed when Beverly sabotaged the experiment that resulted in more than just the death of Kim Anderson. Others had died from a synaptic overload that manifested itself in a form of spontaneous human combustion, and Nathan had come close to dying too. Weirdly, it was Jack who had posed some inane question about circuit breakers that let Henry and the others figure out how to save him. Jack had a habit of doing that, making everyone look like idiots for overlooking the most obvious things, even though the actual resolution of the problem was usually far more complicated than Jack could possibly understand.

"Don't open the door, Nathan!" Jack cried out, and Nathan made soothing noises and murmured soft promises that he wouldn't, hoping that his words might sink into Jack's fevered mind and soothe his fears. He glanced over as Sergeant Collins, one of the military escorts on-board the plane, called for his attention.

"Sir, there's a call on the radio for you."

Reluctant to leave Jack, he pushed up to his feet slowly, glancing back over his shoulder as he headed towards the cockpit. He left Collins watching over Jack just as Collins had done from the start of the flight, understanding the necessity despite the restraints. Jack was still thrashing his head from side to side, caught in whatever nightmare fed into his delirium.

"Nathan? How's Jack?" It was Allison.

"Sick." He rubbed his hand across his forehead tiredly and sighed heavily. "His fever's spiking and nothing I've tried is helping. Perhaps if I had better facilities-."

"Don't blame yourself, Nathan. Even with the whole of Global's medical section focused on this outbreak, we've not saved a single victim."

Nathan tightened his lips and covered his tired eyes with one hand, desperately trying to think of a solution but even if he could put Jack in a bath of ice... He straightened. "Allison, I want a cryochamber prepared for Jack. I need to buy him more time."

She was silent for a moment before he heard her giving the order to Fargo. "I'll have one waiting for him."

"Doctor Stark!"

His head whipped round at Zoe's sharp and fearful cry, twanging already sore neck muscles. Nathan rushed back into the main cabin only to have Collins plant himself in Nathan's path to Jack. Despite his extra height, Nathan pushed against the other man - uselessly as Collins was more muscular and better trained. Beyond him Jack had gone deathly still.

"I'm sorry, sir. I have my orders. You are no longer allowed to approach him."

Nathan tried his hardest glare, the one that usually had others quaking in their boots, but it had no effect on Collins. Nathan stopped pushing against the airman, feeling his heart breaking as he continued to stare at Jack's still figure over Collin's shoulder. 

"No," he breathed as the fight left him.

Just a few more hours and they would have reached Eureka. He could have put Jack in a cryochamber and kept his body in stasis while they continued searching for a cure.

Just a few more hours.

Zoe was sobbing hysterically and he turned to her, finally noticing that John was restraining her from rushing over to her father's side. Nathan went to her, wrapping his arms around her. She struggled and kicked, but he held on tight until she crumbled in his arms, burying her small head against his chest as she sobbed her heart out. He rocked her slowly, sharing her grief even if he could not show it as openly. Eventually, he sank down onto the bench on the opposite side of the plane from Jack, still holding her tight as her sobs gave way to exhaustion and sleep.

He made a silent promise in that moment that he'd always be there for her; that he would treat her like his own daughter, for Jack's sake.

He spent the next two hours watching Jack's still body while Collins stood guard, waiting for the moment when Jack would twitch back into life, knowing it could take any time from a matter of minutes to several hours. The plane landed and he held onto Zoe tightly as the medical team entered wearing full protection gear. They wheeled in a hard-shelled, quarantine body container and, carefully, they removed the handcuffs and straps that had restrained Jack and placed his body into the container, sealing it. He was grateful that they treated Jack's body with the utmost respect.

"Are we sure he's dead?" one of the orderlies asked, and the other shrugged, but none of them knew enough about the ' _undead_ ' to make assumptions. Not even Nathan.

He had seen the zombies up close while fighting his way out of D.C. but he'd not seen them in that hibernation state between dead and undead. He hadn't even stopped to consider if the zombies still had a pulse or if their lungs still worked, even though he did wonder how they could move if they didn't have a working respiratory system to pass oxygenated blood to work the muscles. Perhaps it was just the higher functions of the brain that had died, and not the body so much. Except zombies registered no heat like a living person, and the accumulation of injuries would surely take its toll eventually, he thought.

Zoe was still asleep despite the bumpy landing, exhausted by the events of the last few days, so he lifted her in his arms and carried her off the transport plane and onto the small bus that would take them all to Global. From his window seat, he watched as they loaded the container holding Jack's body into another vehicle.

"Doctor Stark, we'll head straight to the infirmary so we can check you all out."

Nathan nodded, feeling too numb inside to argue. Zoe awoke as they reached Global but she stayed wrapped around him as they got off the bus and headed inside. When he reached the infirmary, he was surprised by the level of frantic activity, and he felt Zoe's head raise from where it had laid against his chest, both of them staring as the body container was wheeled in and Jack removed and placed on a bed. Nathan stalked across the room quickly with Zoe still clinging to him, looming over the doctors gathered around the bed.

"Allison? What's going on?"

Allison glanced over her shoulder, momentarily startled by Nathan's presence before returning to her task.

"We don't know. We thought he was... dead but..."

"But?"

Allison cut him another look and her voice was filled with awe when she next spoke. "The fever's broken and he's not dead, Nathan. Just deeply asleep. Probably physically exhausted from fighting the fever."

She stepped back to let one of the other doctors take over, placing her small hand on Nathan's arm and leading him a few feet away. She paused for a moment, staring down at Zoe who was still clinging to Nathan tightly, though her eyes kept darting to the action taking place around her father. Nathan could see the hope filling her eyes, and knew his own mirrored that same hope.

"Nathan, he's still alive. I've checked reports from around the world and they have heard of no one who has survived being bitten. _No one_. Not only is this a miracle, but his blood might provide us with a vaccine. A cure for the zombie plague."

Nathan only heard the first part. "Jack's alive?"

"My dad's alive?"

Allison blinked as both Nathan and Zoe spoke at the same time, and Nathan felt suddenly lightheaded, feeling his knees weaken. He sat down on the closest medical bed with Zoe beside him and felt Allison's hand pushing his head down, telling him to take deep breaths.

Jack was alive. Jack had survived.

Three hours later, while he was dozing fitfully in a chair beside Jack's bed, having refused to leave Global despite being dead on his feet - and that was a phrase he wasn't planning to use lightly any more - Nathan stirred when he felt Jack's fingers tighten around his own. He blinked the sleep from his eyes and smiled as he met equally tired blue eyes staring back at him.

"Hey. How are you feeling?" Nathan asked softly.

Jack frowned as if taking an internal stock of his own condition. "Like I just went ten rounds with Mike Tyson."

Nathan grinned because they were both sporting bruises from surviving separate zombie attacks, plus the flu-like symptoms of the fever would have made every one of Jack's bones and muscles ache.

Nathan looked up automatically to check the level in the I.V. bag that had been keeping Jack hydrated. "How's the headache?"

"Better." Jack frowned. "Not that I'm ungrateful, but why am I not... undead? And who do I have to thank for that?"

Nathan grinned softly.

"You. You are the reason you are not... undead," he said, using Jack's own phrasing. "You and those ancient spores that made you irresistible. Only two people were infected by the spores. You and Doctor Stone, who also shows signs of having immunity to this plague. Not that we plan to test that theory out on him." He smiled again. "The Carter vaccine is already being shipped. It won't stop people dying from severe wounds gained during a zombie attack, but it will stop those who survive being bitten from falling sick and becoming zombies."

"And those already turned?"

Nathan sobered and shook his head. There was nothing anyone could do for them as everything that had made them an individual human being was gone - all their memories and thoughts and dreams. They were brain dead except for the autonomic responses that kept the body moving and seeking fresh protein fuel - meat.

He felt Jack weakly squeeze his fingers again and leaned in, kissing Jack softly before pulling back only far enough to rest his forehead against Jack's.

"Don't ever die on me again, Jack."

"I didn't die this time."

"No. You didn't... but for a few hours I thought you were dead and-."

Jack shushed him with a kiss. "Not dead," he murmured, and Nathan sighed happily.

"No. You're not."

****

**Epilogue**

Allison allowed Jack out of quarantine a week later, though he had slept through most of that week, and he was surprised when he was taken to a beautiful house surrounded by a well-kept garden. It was a far cry from his first day as Eureka's sheriff when he had spent the first night trying to get comfortable on the cot in his jail cell before Fargo snuck in and took him to the bunker. About the only thing that hadn't changed was that he'd arrived with nothing but the clothes on his back. He recalled that it had taken several days before the moving company had located all his missing possessions, and only then because Jo had begrudgingly put in a call using Eureka's D.O.D. connections to put the fear of God - or at least the military - into the company. He suspected she had only done so to stop him from whining. He wasn't sure how long it would take to get his few possessions this time around as Washington D.C. was currently considered a No-Go area, having been overrun by zombies in those few days.

All of the major cities were gone.

Still, it seemed strange not to be taken to the bunker now, even though he had not lived in Eureka for months. Fargo had taken up residence after Jo refused to move in. Apparently, it was either that or taking S.A.R.A.H completely offline to avoid her ' _abandonment issues_ ' turning into another B.R.A.D. incident.

Zoe walked into the house ahead of him as if she owned the place despite having lived there for just a week, but she'd been the same when she had turned up on his doorstep in Eureka. Looking back, he wasn't sure if he had been more shocked by her casual attitude as she stepped into the bunker and demanded to know which was her room, or that, for the first time, she had run away _to him_ rather than just to get his attention by making him go after her.

Despite everything that had happened, he would always look back on those two years in Eureka with warmth because of the people he had met here, and because this place had given him the chance to build a real relationship with his daughter. He was glad to be back.

He followed her as she, offhandedly, waved towards various downstairs rooms in the house but he noticed that she was taking it slow for his benefit, aware that he was still weak from his brush with death... and _un-death_.

"Family room, library, downstairs bathroom, kitchen. Bedrooms are upstairs," she waved a hand towards the stairs but made no move to go up them.

Ducking his head into each room in passing, Jack was impressed. It was a tasteful mix of modern and traditional, and if Jack had to guess it was a man's house, judging by the lack of all but a few feminine touches... and Zoe's clothes, he noticed, spotting a few items strewn across the back of the three-seater couch. It seemed that some things never changed.

It was already late in the afternoon, which meant this was the longest he had stayed awake in over a week. He could feel the exhaustion drawing on his reserves though, tired from just this short walk from the car. He made his way to the couch and sank down, sighing softly as he let his head fall back against the butter-soft leather, and his eyes half-shutter close. 

"Who's house is this anyway?"

"Mine." The casual tone in the deep, familiar voice had Jack opening his eyes fully and looking over his shoulder as Nathan entered the room. "You didn't think I was going to let you stay anywhere but with me?"

Jack smiled softly. "I've learned not to make too many assumptions since coming to this crazy town."

"Hmm. So you can learn. I'm very proud of you, Jack," Nathan stated, but the twinkling in his eyes and the twitch of his lips proved he was teasing.

Jack barely restrained himself from giving a lighthearted but coarse response anyway, and only because Zoe was grinning happily at them from where she had flopped onto a comfortable chair opposite, one leg hanging over the armrest. She pushed up now.

"I'm going to my room to chat with my friends. So... carry on." She waved airily as she lightly ran up the stairs.

Nathan smiled after her but didn't waste any more time. He sat down beside Jack, drawing him in and kissing him soundly. Wrapping his arms around Jack, he held on tight and Jack fancied that he heard Nathan breathing him in as his nose nuzzled Jack's hair.

"I missed you," Nathan murmured.

"You saw me two hours ago... and you couldn't tell me I was coming to live with you?"

Nathan drew back, wearing a chagrined expression. "I didn't want to give you the chance to say no."

"I wasn't going to say no."

"So that's settled," Nathan stated with a casual shrug before looking Jack over carefully, and Jack wondered if the dark circles of exhaustion under his eyes looked even worse in natural daylight. "You're tired."

"Yeah. Can't seem to shake it."

"You will. Just give yourself more time to heal." Nathan pushed up and held out his hand. "Come on. There's a bed upstairs with a state-of-the-art contour mattress."

Jack grasped Nathan's hand, allowing Nathan to pull him up and lead him slowly towards the stairs. He noticed Nathan hang back a step, allowing Jack to go first, ostensibly standing ready to help him if needed. Jack took the stairs slowly but he was still shaking from the exertion by the time he reached the landing. He felt Nathan's hand under his elbow, supporting him and nodded his gratitude.

A sound of girlish laughter had Jack looking along the landing towards the door at the far end. A large poster declared it as Zoe's Room, and Jack grinned before sobering slightly and looking to Nathan.

"Thank you... for taking care of Zoe."

"She's a good kid. I like her."

Nathan led him into the master bedroom and helped Jack sit down on the side of the bed.

"Lay down," Nathan ordered, pushing at Jack's shoulder's gently after pulling back the bed covers; Jack was too tired to argue. He closed his eyes as his head hit the pillow, sighing as the mattress molded itself to his body.

"Oh God, I'd forgotten how good this is." Of course he was referring to the mattress back at the bunker back when he had lived there, but Nathan chose not to pick up on it, offering only an indulgent smirk.

He felt Nathan removing his shoes and socks, obligingly lifting his hips as Nathan pulled off his pants, leaving him in just his t-shirt and boxers.

"Shift a little," Nathan ordered in a soft murmur, maneuvering Jack as he slid into the bed beside him, clothed similarly to Jack. He pulled the covers over them and pressed a button that drew the curtains before settling back with Jack's head pillowed on his shoulder, holding Jack tight in his arms.

Momentarily Jack thought of the others he and Nathan had ' _saved_ '.

Tina's parents were still missing, presumed dead or undead, and she was staying with a nice couple who had a girl of a similar age. Jack knew the family from when Zoe had gone to Tesla High, and they were decent people like Pillar's parents. Allison had located Mike and his brother's mother, and she was working on a way to bring her to Eureka. Doctor Stone and his wife had taken in Jorgens' children, who had no living relatives. Apparently the Stones had always wanted children but had left it too late. The other two teenagers and Evie were settling into new homes with welcoming families.

Nathan had pulled strings to get Henry returned to Eureka but there was no news on Abby, and Jack feared the worst. He might no longer be in love with her but she was still Zoe's mother, and he hated seeing that dark shadow of grief in his daughter's eyes. As for Lexi, he had heard from her and, fortunately, their remote location had kept them safe. Nathan had convinced her to return to Eureka with her husband and the twins, and she would be arriving some time tomorrow. Of course Jack wouldn't feel happy until he had seen her and his nephews safe and sound. Yeah, and Duncan too. After all, any man willing to put up with his wacky sister was a saint in Jack's books.

Outside of this room, of this small town, the world was still falling, caught within the grip of the zombie plague but Jack knew he had made a difference. He had survived where everyone one else bitten had died, and all because he'd once been infected by the spores of a millennia-old fungi. Apparently Penicillin was also a fungus, and even he knew how that had changed the world. Yet it still seemed weird that one embarrassing incident for him among many in Eureka had given the world a fighting chance to survive this plague, though he knew it would take years before the threat was fully contained.

Between the vaccine and Eureka's defense grid, he knew they were safe here. Zoe and the other kids could grow up, play in the yard, and go to school like normal kids, and all without the fear of attack hanging over them.

He smiled against Nathan's skin. He was probably the luckiest man alive and not just because he had survived a zombie bite. He had found his way home to the man he loved, though he had to admit that in all his fantasies, being in bed with Nathan had involved far more athletic ' _between the sheets_ ' action than cuddling and sleeping. And yet it didn't feel weird to simply be held in Nathan's arms, safe and secure.

He breathed in Nathan's very male scent and let sleep take him, deciding he could work on those fantasies later, when they woke up.

****

Nathan sighed as he felt Jack relax into sleep. It was hard to believe that less than two weeks ago his whole world had turned on its head.

Despite the harrowing journey from Washington D.C., he had never been happier in his life than in this moment, and not even his memories of falling in love with Allison all those years ago compared to how deeply he felt about Jack now.

With Jack it was different somehow - sharper, brighter, more certain of going the distance. He could see his future with Jack stretching before him, and he was excited and even a little terrified at the prospect. It was a good feeling.

For a moment he wondered if he had swapped places with the Nathan from this universe, or if that other universe had simply ceased to exist, replaced with this one. The scientist in him wanted to find out, but as Jack snuffled and buried deeper into his arms, he realized that he was more than happy to simply let it remain a mystery.

In this universe he had Jack Carter alive and whole and in his bed, and there was no other place in time or space that he wanted to be except right here with him.

END

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Art: The Falling World](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1183851) by [sian1359](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sian1359/pseuds/sian1359)




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